Gamers prove equal to surgeons in operating robotic surgery tools

Playing video games every day may lead to better, modern surgery skills.

A maternal nag familiar to the ears of many young gamers usually follows the lines of "you're wasting your life in front of a console." Browbeaten controller wielders rejoice—a new study from the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) has proven the superior hand-eye coordination skills honed from hours of joystick-based gaming are the same talents required to master the world's most advanced robotic surgery tools.

The study sought to identify the developmental effect video games have on training future surgeons. "A new era has started," explainedSami Kilic, lead author of the study and associate professor and director of minimally invasive gynecology at UTMB. Kilic was inspired to conduct the study after seeing his son easily take control of a robotic surgery simulator at a medical convention. "Robotic surgery has been implemented in the medical field recently—most of the physicians were not trained for it. We had to come up with an idea of how to train our trainers."

A group of physicians studying at UTMB—a world leader in robotic surgery—was put up against US high school and college students in a series of robotic surgery simulation tests. The study measured participants on 20 different skills, including how steady their grasping abilities were when performing surgical tasks such as passing a needle or lifting surgical instruments. There were 32 different teaching steps required to operate the robotic surgery simulator—a training tool with dual hand-operated controllers. Real-time surgical movements are displayed on its video monitor.

The surgical skills of the high school students (who played video games an average of two hours a day) and the college students (some of whom spent four hours a day gaming) were found to be equal to the UTMB physicians—and in some cases, even exceeded the skills of the residents. The UTMB physicians were able to save face when the same test groups were asked to perform non-robot-assisted laparoscopic surgery, the physicians unsurprisingly coming out on top.

"Most physicians in practice today never learned robotic surgery in medical school," said Kilic. "However, as we see students with enhanced visual-spatial experience and hand-eye coordination that are a result of the technologically-savvy world they are immersed in, we should rethink how best to teach this generation."

The study noted the additional two hours the college students spent gaming when compared with the high school students didn't seem to provide them with any additional advantage when using the robotic surgery simulator. This led Kilic to observe that two hours might be the optimal time spent at the controls of the robot simulator. While young gamers might now rightfully claim that time spent at the controller is building useful (robotic surgery related) skills, the argument runs dry beyond the two-hour mark.

The number of subjects was too small to draw any strong conclusions, specially regarding the effect of training beyond 2 hours a day. Besides, the effect of surgery-focused would probably be greater than the video-game-based effect. Anyways, as a gamer myself it's always good to see coverage of my hobby in a good light

I'd recommend Tilt to Live for iOS for any future surgeons out there. It's a great game on its own, but when you realize that advancing in the game necessarily means improving your reaction speed and fine muscle control in your arms, it starts to almost feel like a productive way to spend time. I know this probably sounds like an ad, but it's not, I just want good surgeons out there when I'm old enough to need them.

So, will extended IRC sessions make me equal to a professional typist? Will my time spent playing minesweeper make me equal to a trained designer using InDesign? Will all my years of driving freeway circuits in a Chevy Malibu make me equal to a NASCAR driver?

In short... yes, but also no, not really. Familiarity with the interface used by a tool has very little to do with skilled use of that tool.

The number of subjects was too small to draw any strong conclusions, specially regarding the effect of training beyond 2 hours a day. Besides, the effect of surgery-focused would probably be greater than the video-game-based effect. Anyways, as a gamer myself it's always good to see coverage of my hobby in a good light

Sure, the numbers they pulled out of the air to explain why random college students weren't more better than the high school students are pretty meaningless. The real point is that 18, presumably fairly random, high school and bachelor students were more competent with the basic tools than people we rely on to not kill us when using them.

This study presents a preponderance of evidence that bears further investigation.

Gamers are a tremendous human resource. I bet we could create an army of remote operators of construction equipment on orbit and on the Moon. Sure, there'd be hella lag, but MMO gamers have been dealing with lag for years. It would be far worse lag than they'd have online, but they'd be doing it for their country, and for the human exploration of space!

Seriously... this is how it's worked since the dawn of the industrial revolution. Why should we expect any less?

Longer Version:

As the people who develop new tech and systems grow into their fields, their history of tech is going to come with them. These high school/collage kids that are good at this, are good at it because the people who designed such machines (possibly subconsciously) designed them in this way *because they played games* and it seemed only natural. It's exactly the same reason that we are seeing headlines about drone pilots and missile system operators who are really great at what they do, because the interface is basically a video game - they've functionally been training for that kind of thing since they were old enough to pick up a controller.

These results are not even remotely surprising. Any surprise would have been if it was the other way around.

"The surgical skills of the high school students (who played video games an average of two hours a day) and the college students (some of whom spent four hours a day gaming) were found to be equal to the UTMB physicians—and in some cases, even exceeded the skills of the residents."

Personally, the test of surgery superiority is what happens when things go wrong - and not simply the ability to operate a robot.

Its like driving under the influence. 99 times out of 100, you would probably get home safely. But that one instance that would kill you and others around you. Similarly with operations, it's when complications occur that the surgery skills are assessed - not simply the ability to follow rote instructions

The UTMB physicians were able to save face when the same test groups were asked to perform non-robot-assisted laparoscopic surgery, the physicians unsurprisingly coming out on top.

Eh? Asked to perform or allowed to perform? If it is the latter then W...T...F? Did they really let the gamer kids cut someone open? o.O

I'm thinking this would be on a cadaver or some kind of simulated test setup made of ... I dunno... plastic and gelatin or something.

There are a bunch of skills you need to be a good surgeon, "squick" resistance being an important one! This isn't a surprising result at all, but I think it would be more applicable to situations where in-person presence is impossible such as UAVs and space probes.

This is more telling than is being shown here. These surgeons are the best of their classes to have even made it to be surgeons. They did not test the best video game players of their generation against these guys. That means that some average game player is as good at moving robots as great doctors. I want to see a competition of the best surgeon vs the best gamer. That will show us something.

There are a bunch of skills you need to be a good surgeon, "squick" resistance being an important one! This isn't a surprising result at all, but I think it would be more applicable to situations where in-person presence is impossible such as UAVs and space probes.

As an actual surgeon (as well as video gamer), I'd like to point out that the surgical skills they are testing are probably the least important aspect of surgery.

Using a scalpel, suturing, using endoscopes, operating under a microscope, using a laser, operating with a robot - these skills are vary easy to master, compared to the time it takes to truly understand the anatomy and pathology of the diseases you are treating.

Having used the robot simulators they're talking about, they require no particular medical knowledge to operate and are very easy to use. The controls are quite intuitive - you put your thumb and index finger into a glove and all the movements of your hands and your grasping movement is translated into the screen, all with dampening systems to make fine movements steady.

Quickly and smoothly identifying all the different squidgy bits inside a human body, knowing where and how you can cut them and what you might damage if you do, understanding the relationship between anatomy and disease, these are all much harder than operating a game controller or a robot.

My parents never complained at me for playing computer games; my Dad just told me that he felt safe in the knowledge that the day there was either an alien invasion or a zombie apocalypse, somone in the family was fully trained in dealing with such a situation.

... high school students (who played video games an average of two hours a day) and the college students (some of whom spent four hours a day gaming) ...

Does nobody even blink at numbers like this anymore?

I think "a day" is weird. It's probably better (and more telling) to discuss per week.

"Two hours a day" can easily mean 0 min Mon-Fri and 7 hours a day Saturday and Sunday (to hit the number with some napkin math).

You can say, that as a professional in a demanding field, I play an hour a day, or you can admit I build most of my play time up on the weekend when my work responsibilities are primarily comprised of being able to get into the office within two hours should there be a reason to. You see the doubling amongst college students who have a higher likelihood of not having to go to class every day; which is not all that surprising.

Also unsurprising is that gamers have better fine motor skills, particularly in the context of a hand-eye coordination problem. If I'm remembering correctly the Army published a study indicating that the prevalence of military shooters made the Iraq/Afghanistan veterans the most effective riflemen in America's history, primarily because the instinct to "fire over" had already been trained out of them (this being the phenomenon wherein a trained rifleman still fails to hit the target because of the moral conundrum surrounding shooting at another person.)

Don't know a whole lot about the surgeon selection process, but I like to believe they know more about medicine than I do.

As a surgeon who trains residents to use the robot mentioned (Intuitive's DaVinci system) I'd have to say that this study speaks more to the apt nature of the company's name than anything else. The system is truly intuitive. My 7 year old son sat down at one (at an expo, not an OR) and using the touch screen I directed him on how to throw a suture through a rubber model that simulates an incision and then tie a knot within a few minutes. That was the first time he'd ever touched the machine. That doesn't say anything about his dexterity or speed of skill acquisition or even my teaching skills. It really is an amazing piece of technology that enables surgeons (both good and bad) to do things they could not otherwise.

I'm a gamer, so I can't say how easy it would have been to sit down without gaming experience and do the VR simulations that one can do on the DaVinci. But I do know that the first time you hold traditional straight-stick laparoscopic instruments (for surgery or on low-fidelity physical or high-fidelity VR trainers), it is most certainly NOT instantaneously intuitive like the DaVinci is. The DaVinci VR training skill games are nothing like surgery in their import or impact obviously, but they do closely approximate the necessary movements.

When I get a chance, I'd like to track down the original study. The article makes no mention of the skill of the surgeons but does note that they are residents. Since the shortest surgical residency is 4 years in length, the surgeons could have been interns with no more exposure to or experience in robotic surgery than a random person off the street. Which is another problem - where is the control group? The non-gamer, non-surgeon subjects? Another question is how much gaming experience the surgeons had also.

I love seeing stuff like this that we can sort of jokingly throw around as evidence of the benefits of something that we might otherwise be made to feel is a waste of our time, but really it makes a nice media blurb and not much else. I won't be able to convince any critical thinkers until someone creates a study that uses a mix of VR and physical models and also includes a large number of at least 4 subject groups - non-gamer college students, gamer college students, non-gamer surgeons and gamer surgeons. Preferably the gamers (surgeons and non-surgeons alike) could be stratified by some metric of skill (how, I don't know. Hours played may be the best, though inaccurate, surrogate). The surgeon's performances should also be stratified by level of training - intern, senior resident, attending physician, accomplished robotic surgeon with 10 years experience, etc. THAT is a study I'd love to see.

We could have "tele-doctors" just guide the patients like that T.V. commercial.... "ok, now twist the left robotic control arm 30 degrees and make a forward motion until your needle is just in front of the anterior left descending artery.....".. High school gamer asks "Shouldn't you be doing this?"

... high school students (who played video games an average of two hours a day) and the college students (some of whom spent four hours a day gaming) ...

Does nobody even blink at numbers like this anymore?

I don't see how they could manage 2 hours per day, let alone 4. I could see however doing homework throughout the week and spending 1 or 2 days binge playing 12-18 hours though: I did that for Halo 4. I bought it on Tuesday, yet only popped it into my system Friday night. Beat the game on Heroic and got to rank 12 playing Infinity Slayer the rest of the night.

I'll have to see if I can find the article, but I remember reading a study a few years back that surgeons that play video games regularly perform arthroscopic (scope based) surgery faster and with fewer mistakes than surgeons who don't play games. It has almost always been known that there is a definable link between hand-eye coordination and playing games.

This is more telling than is being shown here. These surgeons are the best of their classes to have even made it to be surgeons. They did not test the best video game players of their generation against these guys. That means that some average game player is as good at moving robots as great doctors. I want to see a competition of the best surgeon vs the best gamer. That will show us something.